Non-disclosure agreement for an employee

Anecdotal evidence suggests that current and former employees are responsible for most leaks of business information. A good employment contract will help; however, having a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) in place might just remind them of their confidentiality commitments.

Plugging the leaks

A good employment contract should include suitable terms whereby your employees are under an implied duty not to use confidential information in a manner that will harm your business. So check to see what your employment contracts say about confidentiality. You can raise its profile if you have a new project coming up by sending a memo to all employees reminding them of their implied duty to the company. However, it is still better to get this in writing as an NDA for those employees directly involved in the project.

To make sure the NDA is enforceable (through the courts if necessary) you will need to be specific from the outset about the information and documents that will be the subject of the confidentiality agreement. However, you'll also need words classifying as confidential “any information that will be disclosed later”, so that the NDA will continue to apply.

Start with our Non-Disclosure Agreement for an Employee and then add to the body the specific information you’d like to be treated as confidential (or include this as a schedule to the agreement).

Get your employees to sign theirs first and keep these on their personnel file.